Caryl oneshots
by andyoo
Summary: random oneshots about Carol and Daryl


LITTLE BIRD

The first thing that comes to his mind when he thinks of her is a little bird. A sparrow, common bird, not the prettiest with a gentle and simple nature – a creature that can be easily taken advantage or taken care of; he knows this by experience.

He was five then, it was a lean winter with is older brother stuck again in the juvenile prison, his father was passed out on the couch smelling of whiskey and cheap perfume while his ma was out again with that other man she kept on bringing home – he was five, when he saw a sparrow that's made a nest in one of the old tires at the back of their trailer park, there were no more newborns except one tiny brown chick that chirped pitifully on the nest.

He took it and gave it its own place on the top shelf of his room, fed it a few times and it never left – least not until his older brother came home and squished his pet in his meaty fist.

He learned not to take in strays anymore.

"Daryl…" a small uncertain voice called

For now, he'd ignore her calls, not while his brother's watching. What they shared while they thought his brother was dead has to be hidden. Daryl knows this – Merle has never taken kindly to strays, he just wishes that when all is said and done, she'd still take him in her arms – as openly as she did before. That when it all blows over, she'd get his point that he was only trying to protect her cause if he didn't then he knows, Merle can crush her as easily as he did his sparrow.

UNPRETTY

She wasn't the prettiest of women that he'd seen. He rolled around the hay with blonde southern bombshells who knew how to drink like their fathers and fuck like porn stars and he'd like to think that he understands the definition of pretty. Still, he's pretty sure she isn't it.

Shorn white hair and a too easily trusting face. Wide blue eyes that show too much emotion and a heart that gives too much and takes nothing. She's also possessed a gentler nature than most, even when she fights, she doesn't raise her voice, she would look at you and in her eyes – you'd read it all.

Daryl does not like it. Too fragile, too delicate, too innocent and helpless – pitiful for a world like the one that they're stuck in. He had always admired women with conviction – who could fight their own battles and stand on their own, in a world like theirs – they'd need someone like that too. But they get her and all the other women in their camp who were more whine than work and were too nosy for their own good.

Still, he looks at her, the way she holds onto her child dearly and how she endures her husband's abuse. From afar he'd observe her as she gets out of her family's tent with fresh bruises and silently observes her ignoring those. It was a cycle – she'd get up half black and blue, do her chores with her husband watching her like a hawk, they'd eat, sleep, get up again, with more bruises to show – but she loves her child, takes care of her, protects her from her pa's drunk swinging fists, way more than anyone ever did for him.

He likes to think that he watches her because she reminds him of his childhood, when his pa's drunken fists take out his ma and his would scream and run out and his Pa would beat Merle while he hide and pray to god his Pa does not find him. And how in the evening his Ma would come back, take care of his Pa and hold him and Merle crying and then it would all repeat come morning.

But it's different, he knows so – she never left Sofia, not like his Ma who went out for, what she said would be a walk and came back later in a wooden cart, apparently shot herself in fron of the church where his Ma and Pa tied the knots.

She's not beautiful, but he understands her hidden strength in remaining standing even after so long. She's like the other women – whining, pitiful and he hates how most of the time she's like a lost little dog.

This is why he doesn't get why he trips over his own feet when in front of her, an extra meanness to cover up his weakness for added measure and he thinks –

"Why the fuck did I fall in love with you?"

NOT MINE

'Not mine' he thought 'not my daughter' and he ignored how his heart clenched some more at the thought.

She's a pretty little girl, with blond hair and bright haunted blue eyes, a smart little girl that somehow wasn't a child at all. He knew from experience that growing in an abode with warring parents, no matter how complacent the other parent is, would strip a child of its innocence. He grew up fast enough and that girl was holding on to what could still be salvaged and called her childhood. The little girl who he did all he can to find. She'd been with them all along, stuck in a barn, body dead and rotting but with a feral mind that only said 'food'.

'but she's not yours' there's that voice again 'she was not your child, neither is she' and his mind wanders to shorn white hair and wide blue eyes 'she wasn't and isn't yours, not like you can just go up and stake a claim on her'

And so, he wonders why he cares so much, on why he was so affected by Sofia's death when she hadn't been Daryl's daughter at all.


End file.
